“Yes. Those are gone now. Pour yourself a drink. You’ll be needing it.”
Afterward, when Derek had stripped her existing makeup away, Sofia dressed in the lime-green velvet gown. Lines covered her bare face. Dark half circles hung below her eyes. Her skin, once soft and even, bloomed with splotches of red.
“There, Derek. What say you now?”
Derek’s face bore a strange look. Like he felt both happy and sad. Happy-sad. “It’s possible you look lovelier now than before.” He wiped a tear.
“We both know that’s not possible, Derek, but I accept the compliment anyway.”
She walked onto set. Jack looked at her. “I almost didn’t recognize you,” he said.
“Well, this is what I look like,” she said. “Will this be a problem for you?”
“No,” he replied and said no more. He escorted her to her mark.
Sofia waited for Jack to call action, then delivered a three-minute monologue about muslin. Every line written big, she played small. Every line that felt small, she played big. The words she thought to shout before, she now whispered with a grand smile. Her lime-green dress, rather than evoking mocking—though it did that too—added a Shakespearean-fool, tragic wisdom to her virtuoso, a grand irony, a pit of sadness. When the time came for her immortal line, “we none of us have a stitch to wear,” she said it with resignation, as though the character had said it for years, in places not shown in the film, and saying it once more now placed her on the brink of polite despair.
She did not say it morosely or bitterly, or go for the crotch and deliver it in cheap parody or schtick; she did not sneer or cackle as she spoke. Sofia said the line with kind, knowing eyes, as tears wetted them. She might have been a woman having a nervous breakdown, or she might have been bored with it all. Who knew for sure? But with a little help from some eye bags, divorce papers, and advice from the book’s author, that day Sofia took Mrs. Allen from one dimension to three.
She returned home that night and poured herself a drink. She toasted farewell to her career; it had brought her millions and served her well. She wiped a tear from her lined eyes, for her friend. No one treated her like a star now. No magazine crowned her hottest woman. She raised her glass and went to bed.
SOME MONTHS LATER, Sofia was enjoying a quiet afternoon of sprawling on her sofa when the telephone rang. Max Milson was calling. “Are you sitting down?” her agent said.
“I’m lying down. Does that count?”
“You are up for Best Supporting Actress,” said Max.
“Up for what?”
“For an Oscar! For Mrs. Allen in Northanger Abbey. Break open the champagne!”
Sofia choked on her drink. She was already nursing a bottle of Prosecco—close enough. “How?” she spluttered into the phone.
“Well, I’m not sure of the exact process but I believe the Academy creates a long list, then consults with its members.”
“No,” she interrupted him, “how did I get nominated? I played an old bag! I’ve done scores of films where I was beautiful, sexy, promiscuous—none of them got me anything. Now I get the nod for wearing a lime-green sack? This is bad.”
“It is not bad,” said Max. “It’s good. You played her well, Sofia. You played her true.”
“I do not accept the nomination,” Sofia huffed.
“Yes you do,” said Max. “People will suck up to you and you’ll get loads of free stuff.”
“Fine. I accept the nomination.” Sofia hung up the phone and smiled.
The next few weeks passed in a blur of congratulatory texts, phone calls, and visits from the industry. The texts came from people she’d prefer a phone call from, the phone calls from those she’d prefer a text from, and the visits came from people she hoped never to see again. Sofia had practiced her Oscar acceptance speech every night in the bath since the age of four. Sometimes she chose a gushing and tearful exhibition, thanking everyone who had ever helped her, including her Barbie dolls and her hairbrush. As she’d grown older, the sentiments evolved into a spiteful hate speech, naming the people who pushed her down and thanking them all for sweet nothing. But in the end, when she stood at the podium that February and collected her trophy for Best Supporting Actress in Northanger Abbey, her thank-you speech consisted of five words only.
“This is for you, Jane,” she said, then walked offstage. The crowd seemed so hushed with shock, their faces so fixed in unedifying stares, they had no choice but to give her a standing ovation.
Chapter Fifty-Eight
Fred walked up Praed Street in Paddington to board a train back to Bath. He was heading into the station when something caught his eye. Piles of books lined the dusty window of a secondhand bookshop. Fred chuckled; Jane had teased him about never reading any of her books. He stepped inside. It was a ramshackle room, filled floor to ceiling with books. A rumpled man approached him. His name tag read George. “Something to read on the train home?” he said.
“Do you have anything by Jane Austen?” Fred asked.
George smiled. “Indeed.” He escorted Fred to a shelf of classics.
Fred scanned the book spines. Jane was the author of many of the titles. “What do you recommend? Sorry if that’s a stupid question.”
“Not at all. I get asked about her often. Delighted to help.” George rolled up his sleeves. He selected a title and skimmed through its pages, taking his time. He furrowed his brow, then picked up another and tapped the cover. “This.”
Fred took the book. “Persuasion,” he read aloud.
“It’s not as flashy as P and P or Emma, with the zingers and wit. Those are Jane showing off. Showing why she is the best that ever was,” George said. “This one she wrote as she got older. It’s quieter. It’s the last book she wrote before she
